/ 

R/eoctj ■ d Vol AV. 




THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES, 



E 458 
.3 

.B57 
Copy 1 



BY 



JOEL PRENTISS BISHOP 




BOSTON: 
LITTLE, BROWN AND COMPANY 

1 8 G 3 . 




Class 

Book -T 3 5^ 



THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES 



BY 



JOEL PRENTISS BISHOP. 



BOSTON: 
LITTLE, BROWN AND COMPANY. 






1 8 G3 






Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1863, by 

JOEL PRENTISS BISHOP, 

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 



^'7^ 



CAMBRIDGE: 

Allen auJ Farnham, Printers. 



INTRODUCTORY NOTE. 



These sheets are what may be deemed a reconnois- 
sance, to use a military term, of the public mind in 
respect to some matters connected with the present war. 

I come before the public as one speaking from a dumb 
mouth, that, according to the heretofore popular idea, 
has no right to speak. I never used the breath of 
speech to promote an election, unless I might except an 
unimportant boyish instance which occurred many years 
ago; I was never in office; was never voted for by any 
single man ; I never offered myself as a candidate to 
become a candidate for the public vote ; was never a 
candidate ; was never a member of a political party, — 
How, then, can I properly say any thing on public 
affairs ? 

In the first chapter of this pamphlet I mean to show, 
that the troubles of this country grow, at least in part, 
out of its politics; the politicians mend not, but they 
mar; therefore, perhaps a word from a man who \a not 
a politician may be, though not asked for by the commu- 
nity, not unacceptable ; at all events, notunadapted to the 
public needs. 



4 INTRODUCTORY NOTE. 

The brevity with which I write, compels me to omit 
notes, and citations of authorities, from which the truth 
of my propositions might be made more fully to appear. 
This pamphlet is addressed to men who think, and to 
men who know. If there are those among us who need 
to be educated into the truth of the law as already ad- 
judged by the courts, and as acted upon by the other 
departments of our government, and into the truth of the 
history of our country's present troubles, this pamphlet is 
not for them. It is intended simply to furnish hints for 
the thoughtful, in matters pertaining to the law oi' the 
subject; and thoughts for the informed, in matters per- 
taining to its history and (if the expression may convey 
my idea) to its politics. 

My desire is only for tin- puMir good; I voted neithei 
for nor against the present incumbent of the presiden- 
tial chair; 1 care not who, so far as concerns individual 
aspirations and party names, shall be his successor; or 
who shall fill any of the various offices in Nation and 
State, provided only that I may be myself excused. 

J. P. B. 
Boston, May 20, 18G3. 



THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES. 



CHABTER I. 

WHENCE CAME THIS \V A I; 

The answer to this question has varied accord- 
ing as the person to whom it is addressed, happens 
to be impressed with one cause or with another; or 
happens to be in the mood of telling what he deems 
to be the exact truth, or in the mood of election- 
eering for his party. 

In human affairs there is, perhaps, no such thing 
as a one and sole cause producing a particular 
result; or, if in a given case there is, inquiry will 
show, that the cause itself was the result of an an- 
tecedent cause, whence the second result is nearly 
as distinctly traceable to the first cause as to the 
second. 

Had there been no wickedness in the land, then- 
had been no war. Had this wickedness not devel- 
oped itself in political lying, there had been do war. 

Had there been no ignorance in the land, there 
had been no war. Had not the ignorance of the 
people, especially the people of the South, been 



6 THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES. 

taken advantage of by self-seeking politicians, there 
had been no war. 

Had freedom of speech and the press prevailed 
over the whole country, or had it prevailed at the 
South as generally as at the North, there had been 
no war. Had not the politicians of the land availed 
themselves, for selfish purposes, of the existing state 
of things in this respect, to put down, or attempt to 
put down, their several opponents by falsehood, 
there had been no war. 

Had there been no slavery at the South, there 
had been no war. Had not the politicians of the 
land availed themselves of the slavery question to 
promote their personal or party ends, there had 
been no war. 

Had not slavery stood in the way of free speech 
and a free pic—, there had been no war. Had not 
southern politicians, in conjunction with northern 
political allies, availed themselves of the existing 
state of things in this respect, to pervert the un- 
derstandings of the simple-minded and uninformed 
at the South, and to fill their ears with falsehoods 
against classes of people at the North, there had 
been no war. 

Let us, however, consider whether there is not 
another way to answer the question with which this 
chapter opened. Wickedness, ignorance, and a dis- 
position to domineer by suppressing free discussion, 
and the like, are necessarily attendant on the 
human state below. But civil war is not necessarily 
attendant on a republic ; therefore, when we look 
for what may appropriately be termed the cause 



WHENCE CAME THIS WAR i 



of this war, we must look for something besid 
these, for something which may be remedied, for 
something not necessarily attendanl on human affairs 
It must be assumed, at the outset of the inquiry, 
that the nation is composed of men, that, therefore, 
it is not composed of mere abstractions, or fancies 
swimming in politicians' brains. It' there had been 
no men in our country, there had been do war; 
yet we do not say that the cause of the war is 
the existence of men on our soil. We assume thai 
there are men here; that the men are made of hu- 
man, not of angelic, stuff; and, this premised, we 
ask, What is the cause of the Avar ? 

One man answers, — "The cause of the war ifl 
slavery." But there are among us those who will 
not allow this answer to be good; because, they 
say, that the relation of master and slave is the rela- 
tion which, while men are men, must subsisl be- 
tween Anglo-Saxons and negroes dwelling in one 
country. Therefore they say, that to set down 
slavery as the cause is the same as, in general terms, 
to set down human nature as the cause. And if the 
fact be as assumed, the reasoning thus based upon if 
is correct. But those who look to fact to know 
what is fact, instead of consulting theories and 
assuming the fact to be what their theories make it. 
know, that white men and black men can and do 
live together in one country without either race 
being held in slavery by the other. These men also 
say, that the southern stirrers-up of the rebellion 
merely used the slavery matter as the occasion, aoi 
as the cause, of their proceeding; that slavery waa 



8 THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES. 

but the instrument employed, which instrument 
did not organize its own motions. In other words, 
the rebellion, according to them, sprang from 
the selfishness of its leaders, who used the slavery 
question merely as the false pretence. Yet, as to 
this second proposition, it is only the old one, that 
the rebellion came because men are wicked ; while 
we are inquiring, from what cause, independent of 
human wickedness, it proceeded. 

Now, it is true that the leaders of the rebellion 
gave to their dupes lying reasons for getting it up, 
and for proceeding in it, For example, they said, 
and indeed this is the great thing they said, that the 
party which appeared to be becoming dominant at 
the North, meant to interfere unlawfully with the 
institution of slavery at the South; so, to prevent 
this, it was necessary to rebel. Vet they never 
believed the assertion; for, as we all know, when the 
rebel commissioners visited England, to get English 
acknowledgment, they represented to the British 
government that the South had no fear of northern 
aggressions in this matter, which had nearly nothing 
to do with its rebelling; and that the main reason 
was, a desire in the South for free trade, which desire 
was opposed by the North. To be sure the southern 
dupes set down this representation as a nice diplo- 
matic lie, for w T hich their commissioners ought to be 
honored at home ; but, as the commissioners spoke 
from authority, their words must be received as a true 
echo of the real views of the rebel leaders, provided 
those leaders are to be taken as honest. 

Yet when South Carolina seceded, and led the way 



WHENCE CAME THIS WAK 7 9 

for the rest, she based all her complaints on the 

slavery ground; she gave oul tli.it reason to tin- 
world, and she gave no other. And no other reason 
was ever given, in any prominenl way, within the 
borders of any one seceded State. Therefore the 

leaders are not to be taken as honest 

The conclusion is, thai the thing which di honesl 
men successfully used at the South as the wedge 
with which to split open the Union is the cause of 
the war. We all know what that is, there is no dis- 
pute as to what it is, the people of the South, the 
people of the North, the Republicans, the Democrats, 
the everybody, at home and abroad, agree hen' ; it 
is slavery. 

When the war began, it found, neither in the 
President of the United States, nor in any prominenl 
member of his government; neither, also, in any 
great bodies of the people of the North, nor in any 
successful managers of any political party ; a dispo- 
sition to disturb the institution of southern Blavery, 
or even to do or suffer to be done what mere mili- 
tary necessity required in this matter. And it 
sorely puzzled lookers on abroad to understand, how 
there could be a war in which the issue of slavery 
was involved, while the two contending powers vied 
with each other in efforts to sustain the institution. 

But it is believed that a single statemeni of a 
proposition resting in fact will sufficiently ex phi in 
this apparent paradox; namely, — slavery, like the 
tongue of the rebel government, works as well by 
falsehood as by truth; and, as it brought about the 
rebellion by falsehood, it could, of course, set in 



10 THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES. 

dupes on the one side to fighting in favor of the 
common friend of both combatants ; while, of course, 
also, they of the other side, instead of joining issue 
upon the real contest, would endeavor to serve the 
common friend at the same time that they repelled 
the assailant. For illustration : a married woman, 
having a lover outside the marriage bond, falsely 
accuses this lover to her husband ; saying, — "0 my 
husband, the villain means to take away my life." 
Thereupon the husband falls upon the lover with 
blows ; but the lover, of course, is as anxious as the 
other not to do violence to the " cause of the war." 
Let us see, therefore, how slavery has brought 
about this war. At the time when our present Con- 
stitution was formed, there was no slave territory 
belonging to the United States ; there were no slaves 
held under the dominion of the general government ; 
the United States was not a slave-holding nation, it 
had no complicity with the system, though there 
were within the nation slaveholding States. But 
when the Constitution came to be formed, slavery 
presented herself and said, — "I am not content with 
my lot as queen of States, I must be made also 
queen of the Nation." So it was agreed, for so sla- 
very demanded, that, in some particulars, she should 
be put under the national protection. If it be true, 
as affirmed by many, that a fugitive slave law made 
by congress can be constitutional, we shall find an 
instance of this taking of slavery into the General 
Government's bosom in what is called the fugitive 
slave clause of the Constitution ; we find some other 
instances of this in that instrument; but let us look 
still further. 



WHENCE CAMK THIS WAR? I I 

If slavery had been content to remain as Bhe waa, 

queen of States merely, the result would have been, 
that each State would have been left free to mane 
its own domestic concerns in its own way. Instead 
of this we see, that, while the slaveholding States 
exercise, under the Constitution, the righl to mana 
their owm domestic affairs in their own way, this 
right is not permitted to the non-slaveholding Stal 
For example, when a negro goes from Massachu- 
setts to South Carolina (I am speaking of the nut- 
ter as it used to be in time of peace), South Carolina 
takes the negro, shuts him up in jail, makes a Blave 
of him, or does any thing else with him thai Bhe 
chooses. But if a negro conies from South Carolina 
to Massachusetts, to better his condition by the 
change, Massachusetts is forbidden by the Consti- 
tution which slavery made, to manage her domestic 
affair of freedom or bondage in her own way; she 
must hold the negro to be, on Massachusetts soil, a 
slave, liable to be hand-cuffed on her soil, and sent 
back to the place and condition whence he escaped. 
Is the negro property ? That is a question of do- 
mestic institution which slavery says, and made the 
Constitution say, South Carolina may manage in her 
own way, and Massachusetts must manage in South 
Carolina's way, not in her own. 

Well, then, the negro is property (is he'.'); so 
Massachusetts cannot recognize him as a man, hut 
must give back the "property" to South Carolina 
Now comes an election for members of congress, 
— How many members may Massachusetts Bend? 
How many may South Carolina? We firsl count 



12 THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES. 

the Massachusetts men ; but there is a great deal of 
"property" in Massachusetts, — Shall we count it? 
No. Property does not enter into the basis of rep- 
resentation. We next count the South Carolina 
men, — yes, but in South Carolina we count the 
"property" also, and we find more property here 
than men; and five pieces of property count the 
same as three men. In other words, the negro 
slave, when he is in South Carolina, in a position to 
give power to this slaveholding State, is three fifths 
man ; when he comes to Massachusetts, a free State, 
his power still adheres to South Carolina, so now he 
is all property. Slavery said it must be so ; there- 
fore it was, therefore it is. 

Property in Massachusetts sometimes becomes 
unmanageable. Must not South Carolina come, if 
Massachusetts asks, and help manage it ? No ; sla- 
very never said that, she did not put that into the 
Constitution. Suppose " property " in South Caro- 
lina becomes unmanageable ; why, in such a case, 
if South Carolina asks, Massachusetts must go and 
help manage the property. The "domestic vio- 
lence " must be put down ; so slavery said, therefore 
it was, therefore it is. 

Had each State been left free, by the Constitution, 
to manage her own domestic affairs in her own way, 
there had been no war. But because the slavery- 
keeping South had granted to her in this instrument 
the right to interfere in part in the domestic insti- 
tutions of the non-slaveholding North, the South 
has for a long time felt that the North was not suf- 
ficiently obedient, in matters where the duty to obey 



WHENCE CAME THIS \\ LB '.' I '. 

was plain; but, even beyond this, the South, i 
seeing any good reason why she should not have 
more of this Bame power than the Constitution really 
gives her, as well as to have whal it gives, hae clam- 
ored for more, for more, always unsatisfied. She 
has claimed that more was to be found in the Consti- 
tution than is in fact there; then she has claimed 
that the Constitution should be amended so as bo 
give her still more. 

This is the old story; the world knows it !>y 
heart. Put a whip into a man's hand, and tell him 
that with this instrument he may rule, so far, bu1 
no further, over his fellows, and he is never satisfied. 
He will clamor for more power, until either h< 
beaten back, or he breaks down the barrier and 
takes full dominion. 

Had slavery not put into the Constitution any 
right in the South to rule over the North, the south- 
ern mind had not itched for rule, and then there 
had been no war. But the right to rule in the 
domestic affairs of the North having been given to 
the South, forthwith each southern knight of the 
whip looks upon himself as a being superior to the 
northern man, as one divinely ordained to govern 
him; and, human nature being as it is. uneasiness 
must come in the ruler at every wince of the ruled ; 
then must come the demand for fuller sway; then 
the yielding (for such is our history); then the 
fresh demand; then the yielding; till, at last, the 
ruled refusing to bend lower, conies war. This is 
the history, not only of our country, but of the 
world ; thus human nature ever acts. 

2 



14 THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES. 

Now, it is said by some persons among us, and 
denied by others, that between the institutions of 
slavery and freedom there is an " irrepressible con- 
flict ; " and, therefore, one or the other must die out 
in the country, both cannot live together. If sla- 
very had been content with her own, if she had 
never undertaken to control the general govern- 
ment, or to rule free States, there would have been, 
there could have been, no conflict between the free 
and slave States of our country. The free States, 
having never demanded and never received any 
right to control the slave States, have never soiurht 
to exercise such control. They have not claimed 
any such right under the Constitution, neither have 
they ever even suggested the idea of having the 
Constitution amended so as to give them such a 
right. Freedom lias committed do aggressions on 
slavery, and has attempted none. But slavery has 
always been committing aggressions on freedom, 
and at las! she has made war in demand of more. 

We take human nature as we find it; we take 
facts as we find them. Was it a mere mistake that 
slavery demanded queenship under our Constitution, 
— queenship not only in her own married home, but 
a place, also, in her neighbors' beds. — or did this result 
come necessarily out of her nature? 1 do not 
mean to discuss this question. It has always been 
said, that, if freedom had refused the demand which 
slavery made for queenly place here, the Constitu- 
tion could not have been adopted, this government 
could not have been formed, we should have broken 
to pieces in the attempt at its formation. So said 



WHENCE CAME THIS K MR ? I 5 

South Carolina when she seceded, 30 said everybod) 
before, so has said everybody since. Still the facl 
may not be so, or it may. II" it ia so, proving bj its 

existence slavery's unwillingness to live in connec- 
tion with Tree Static unless she can rule them, then 
is it shown that there is an " irrepressible conflict ; " 
that slavery must die, or she will destro} freedom, or 
destroy the republic. Here, at least, in the power 
over free States given to slavery in the Constitution, 
was the original error; it is sufficienl for me thai 1 
have found it. 

Starting, then, with the formation of the Consti- 
tution, slavery has sought rule; and. step by Btep, 
has attained rule. She has tried to perverl the Con- 
stitution, she has tried to change the Constitution ; 
at last, she is trying to destroy the Constitution, that 
she may have greater rule. 

Notwithstanding what she gained in the outset, the 
country could have got on pretty well, if this her 
mistress had steadily adhered to the Constitution as 
originally adopted. But that she had no idea of 
doing. The love of power was too mighty, the taste 
of blood too sweet, to admit of pause. 

There was never an aggressive despot who did 
not complain of his subjects as seeking to deprive 
him of his rights. So has slavery in this country 
done. She has been innocent, weak, imposed upon, 
— so she says, — not sufficiently respected in the 
free States, not duly worshipped. But the poli- 
ticians she has always loved, and they have loved 
her. She has had votes to give; and he who. at 
the North, could tell the most shameless falsehoods 



16 THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES. 

about his neighbors, charge them with the foulest 
tongue, and most blackly, with the purpose to stir 
up southern slaves to violence, or to interfere in 
some southern domestic matter, has got slavery's 
votes. And the southern politicians have learned of 
the northern, and they have won votes by a similar 
process. Thus matters went on ; falsehood was 
heaped on falsehood ; the press was muzzled ; the 
mouth was gagged; till, in due time, the seekers after 
self in southern politics fooled and wheedled the 
] i lasses of their people into a rebellion which will 
either succeed after immense suffering in all the 
southern country, or end in the destruction of sla- 
very herself, — in the former case, the consequence 
to be the piling up of black heap upon black heap, 
until the heaps burst in a bloody servile insurrection, 
and the institution expires in the midst of still 
greater woes to the whites. 



CHA PTEB I I. 

LOYALTY TO THE "CAUSE OF THE WAR." 

Perhaps nothing more clearly impresses a repub- 
lican of these days with the vastness of the chasm 
which separates him from the royalists of the past, 

than to consider from what state of mind the fad 
arose, that a true royalist of old would cling to his 
dear sovereign, although the sovereign overreached 
his powers, debased himself by immoralities, and 
trampled upon the peace of his subjects. 

Even so have we seen of late. When this war 
broke out, it came in a way which, so far as the 
seceded States are concerned, both absolved us from 
the duty of allegiance to our quondam ebon queen, 
and bound us also for her overthrow ; yet we clung 
to the clear creature even more lovingly then than 
we had ever done before. We said, — " She shall iu »1 
be hurt, this queen slavery shall rule still, we will 
continue to kneel to this dear, though she slay us 
yet will we worship and serve. Though she fights 
against us yet will we fight for her, and the more 
she exalts herself over us the more will we debase 
ourselves before her." 

So we sent back the loyal blacks who came to us 
panting to enlist in our ranks, we screamed for white 
war-help and refused to take ebon, we did all we 

2* 



18 THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES. 

could to attach the slaves to their masters and 
detach them from us. But this was not all. The 
moral part must bow as well as the physical. So we 
put forth the falsehood, that the Constitution bound 
us to this course ; great lawyers proclaimed the false- 
hood ; great divines poured it out in pious addresses; 
newspapers showed it in black line upon line ; the 
Republican politicians vied with the Democratic in 
proclaiming it ; there were even anti-slavery lectur- 
ers to swell the note through the country. my 
God ! the thought of this debasement is sickening ! 

Let us see how the matter truly stood. 

In the first place, we were a nation, admitted 
regularly into the family of nations, bound therefore 
by the law of nations. Now. it is a principle of the 
law of nations, that, when a war breaks out, a run- 
tending belligerenl shall strike at the cause of the 
war. The reason of this is plain; every war dis- 
turbs the family of nations, and, if a particular 
nation, drawn into a contest of arms, insists upon 
carrying it on in a way to leave the cans*; of the 
war unsubdued, the contest becomes one of mere 
butchery, the temporary disturbance to the peace of 
the world avails nothing for its permanent quiet, 
and the conflict itself is needlessly prolonged. This 
principle is seen illustrated in the very case now 
under consideration. Slavery stands as the cause of 
the present war. When the rebellion broke out, 
the slaves, the free negroes in the northern States. 
the fugitives who had taken refuge in our neighbor- 
ing Canada, were all eager to come into the Union 
ranks and fight, could they there fight under the 



LOYALTY TO THE "CAUSE OF THE WAR." L9 

banner of freedom. But our governmenl repelled 
them ; and now it must either fail to win, or wiu by 
this very means, after having spent uselessly immense 
treasures of gold and blood, and partially alienated 
those whose alliance was most of all needed for (suc- 
cess. Meanwhile the suffering abroad lias increased 
with the needless prolongation of the war; but, 
what is more, had the original plan of the war suc- 
ceeded, the result could have been only a temporary 
peace, to be followed by greater war-woes to our- 
selves and to neutral nations in due time afterward. 
If the course demanded by the law of nations 
had been found to be contrary to the letter of any 
clause of the Constitution of the United States, -till 
the Constitution should have been interpreted to 
admit of this course; for, by the Constitution, we 
are a nation ; by the Constitution, therefore, we are 
bound by the law of nations ; so that a clause of the 
instrument contrary to the law of nations would be 
repugnant to the superior clauses of the same instru- 
ment which make us a nation ; and, on a principle 
familiar to lawyers, void. This would be putting 
the matter in an extreme way; perhaps the case 
would, rather, stand in fact as the familiar one in 
which an expression general in its terms is controlled 
by an exception growing out of some universal 
principle of law. Thus, by the Constitution, a 
judge is impeachable for malfeasance in office ; yet, 
should a judge in a fit of insanity go contrary to tin- 
law, he would be exempt from punishment, though 
the words of the Constitution contain no such quali- 
fication, The exception comes from a well-known 



20 THOUGHTS FOR THE TD1ES. 

principle of law, which is found outside of that 
instrument. 

But, in fact, so far from the Constitution, or any 
clause of it, being contrary to the law of nations in 
this respect, it operates, in this particular instance, 
directly with this law. 

I do not intend to discuss this matter at length ; 
if the reader will open his copy of the Constitution, 
— should he be destitute of one, let him go and buy 
one, — he will observe a clause which is operative 
both in peace ami in war, out of which clause comes 
the plain result, that our government and our peo- 
ple are bound — were bound on the breaking out of 
the war — to proclaim liberty to the slaves in all 
ilir seceded States. They were not only permitted 
to do it. but bound to do it. The President and 
members ol* the Senate and House of Representa- 
tives who did not act in this direction violated (I 
mean not to speak offensively, but to state the exact 
truth of the law), by this neglect, their oaths of 
office, though, if we accept, as the writer is disposed 
to do, the doctrine held by the late President Jack- 
son and some other-, that the oath of office binds the 
party taking it to administer the office, not as the 
Constitution really demands, but as Ik understands if, 
more or less of them might plead in excuse their 
misapprehension of the law. 

Yet if I intended, as I do not, that this pamphlet 
should contain a thorough discussion of this subject, 
I should see. at the outset, as I do now, one very 
great obstacle in the way of the success of my argu- 
ment. The community has been long accustomed 



LOYALTY TO THE "CAUSE OF THE WAR." 21 

to look at slavery as a thing quite above the Con- 
stitution of the United States. There are men who 
would be satisfied by no language which this instru- 
ment could possibly contain. Why should the serv- 
ant dictate to his master ? Why should the Consti- 
tution, that has been ruled by slavery, perverted 
by slavery, trampled on by slavery, and almost 
broken into pieces by slavery, be referred to as 
establishing any right against slavery ? My reply 
is, that the instrument itself says, Art. VI, — "This 
Constitution, and the laws of the United States 
which shall be made in pursuance thereof, .... 
shall be the supreme law of the land ; and the 
judges in every State shall be bound therein/, any thing 
in the constitution or laws of any State to the contrary 
notwithstanding T There is no difficulty in any man's 
perceiving, that, if a State law or State constitution 
forbids (as I think no one does) the return of a fugi- 
tive slave to his master, such provision in the local 
law of the State is void as being in conflict with the 
Constitution of the United States. This is a matter 
in favor of slavery. But it takes a man of clear 
head and few political prejudices to see, that, when 
a clause of the Constitution of the United States 
bears against slavery, it can have any validity what- 
ever. The long habit of our people, of always see- 
ing the Constitution operate practically in one 
direction, prevents their perceiving the possibility of 
its ever operating in the opposite direction. 

Perhaps a fable may help illustrate this thought. 
There was a boy fond of catching mice in a trap. 
The trap was of wire, with a particular entrance of 



22 THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES. 

well-known form, so made, that, when the mouse 
got in, the wires which had furnished hi in foothold 
for entering, guarded and stopped the exit with 
sharpened points. There was a very old mouse 
that the hoy had caught every night since his papa 
gave him the trap, and let go in the morning. But 
the way the boy let the mouse go was, not to take 
him out at the door; no; but to remove the bottom, 
and let the creature drop. At last, the boy one 
morning, in a pet, opened the door, and told the 
mouse to go out there, and be free ; for, as to the 
bottom, he meant to occupy that himself. " Ah ! " 
said the mouse, "I shall break the constitution of 
this cage if I attempt to go out at aside opening; it 
was built for in-going mice; there is no out-going 
here except toward hell." 

So much lor the habit of the mouse; the habits of 
our loyal men are as inveterate. 

Now, it would be asking too much of the reader, 
who. (luring the last thirty years and more, has 
floated in the stream of things in this country, 
pleased with its How. to require that he, as the con- 
dition on which he is permitted to see the correct- 
ness of the conclusions whereto 1 would lead him, 
should admit the possibility of the authority of the 
Constitution of the United States being superior 
to the authority of the leaders of a rebellion against 
the Constitution in a particular State, if found to 
be in conflict with the behests of slavery. Is not 
the Constitution the flail, and is not slavery the 
arm that wields it ? Shall the flail give law to the 
arm ? 



LOYALTY TO THE "CAUSE OF THE WAR." 23 

Yet among the readers of this pamphlet, it is pos- 
sible some one may be found ready to admit that 
the Constitution is to be taken as the supreme law 
of the land, controlling State laws and State constitu- 
tions. as well when it speaks against, as when it 
speaks for, slavery. Let me first address myself to 
such a reader. 

Turn to Art. IV. § 4, of the Constitution, and you 
find this provision: " The United States shall guarantee 
to every State in this Union a republican form of govern- 
ment ; and shall protect each of them against inva- 
sion, and, on application of the legislature, or of the 
executive (when the legislature cannot be con- 
vened), against domestic violence." It is the former 
clause, here printed in italics, which settles the mat- 
ter now before us. 

Let us suppose (for I wish to keep questions dis- 
tinct), that South Carolina, when she seceded, had, 
instead of waiting to join the then future Jeff Davis 
Confederacy, established at once a kingly govern- 
ment in place of what she terms her republican 
forms: it would then have been the duty of the 
United States to execute the guaranty ; namely, give 
her a republican government. But how was this to 
be done ? A republican government implies the 
voluntary suffrage of free people. That is not a 
republican government in which voters are forced to 
the polls at the point of the bayonet. 

Says one : " Send an army, and subdue the rebel- 
lion." Very well ; but this does not make willing 
voters. If there were no willing voters found, then 
this clause of the Constitution would fail through 



24 THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES. 

the impossibility of its execution. The supreme law 
which sits above all the affairs of men on earth, rul- 
ing nations, ruling constitutions, ruling statute laws, 
ruling the unwritten law, ruling every thing, is Neces- 
sity ; all must bow before this master. But between 
necessity and a clogged "I wont," there is a vast 
difference. 

In the case supposed, the white men of South 
Carolina had refused to carry on a " republican form 
of government ; " but the blacks had not. The 
blacks of South Carolina who are now within our 
lines, are as loyal to the government of the United 
States as any persons within our territorial limits ; 
but the whites are not. The Constitution, therefore, 
lays its power upon what it terms "The United 
States;" namely, upon the President, upon the sena- 
tors, upon the representatives in tin- lower House of 
Congress, upon the men of the army, of the navy, 
upon all of us. and says: " Fulfil your ' guaranty ; ' 
give to South Carolina 'a republican form of govern- 
ment;' release the loyal blacks ; put weapons in their 
hands; put ballots in their hands; the whites have 
refused, take the blacks." And he who has sworn 
to support the ( 'oustitution, yet does not do his part 
to accomplish this object, violates his oath. 

But I am reminded, that the case I put, is not ex- 
actly in form the case which occurred. I assumed, that 
South Carolina, after seceding, set uj> a king. Does 
the fact that she did not set up a king change the 
result? I am ashamed to press this question; for it 
is too plain in itself properly to admit of query, much 
less of argument. The United States guaranties to 



LOYALTY TO THE "CAUSE OF THE WAR." 25 

South Carolina, in the Constitution; first, a "govern- 
ment;" secondly, one " republican in form." Art. 
I. § 10, provides, that the government shall be one 
which does not " enter into any .... confederation." 
Art. VI. provides, that the officers of I lie governmenl 
shall be bound by oath or affirmation, to supporl the 
United States Constitution; and other clauses still 
further show, that the government must be one 
within the Union established by the Constitution. All 
written instruments are to be interpreted by •■"in- 
paring part with part; and our Constitution is no 
exception to this rule. But for this rule, if we were 
to look at the one clause alone, and not at the 
whole instrument, the provision we are considering 
would require the United States, even in ordinary 
times of peace, and as a question separate from that 
of secession and rebellion, to abolish the institution of 
slavery in the States ; for, as a mere naked question, 
considered without reference to the whole instrument, 
or its surrounding facts, a government in which half 
the people are slaves, and half of the remaining half 
are disfranchised because they are poor, is aristocrat 
ical, not "republican." If, therefore, we musl in 
ordinary times look at the whole instrument to ascer- 
tain the meaning of the words "republican form of 
government," in order to relieve the United States 
from the duty, coupled with the power, to abolish 
slavery in the States, equally must we look at the 
whole instrument in times like these, though we 
find it pointing to the opposite result. 

Perhaps no man would hesitate to come to the 
conclusion to which this argument conducts, did In 1 

3 



26 THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES. 

not see in the way the obstacle of opposing State 
laws; but I am now addressing those men who 
understand (assuming there are such men), that no 
State law can present itself and say, — "My name is 
Obstacle, the Constitution of the United States must 
bow before me." 

Having now stated the case sufficiently to satisfy 
those readers, or the reader, who can sec that the Con- 
stitution is supreme, as well where it operates against 
slavery, as where it operates in its favor, I proceed 
with ;i few words for the other class. 

There are some men, though the number at the 
North I think is not large,* who believe that no 
power on earth can lawfully abolish slavery. Ac- 
cording to them, it cannot be done bv the United 
States ; it cannot be done by the States; and. since 
God cannot Bin, it cannot be done by the Supreme 
Being. This residuum of Ball in the cup of our 
humanity, I do not propose to touch. 1 am now 
dealing with those who admit that it is in the power 
of the States to abolish slavery within their respect- 
ive limits. 

Now. under our national Constitution, there are 
two ways in which a State can proceed to abolish 
slavery within its limits. One way is. by the ordi- 
nary course of legislation, either with or without an 
alteration of the State Constitution : the other way is, 
for the free people of the State to refuse to carry on 
" a republican form of government," within the 
meaning of the Constitution of the United States ; 
that is, to secede ; and so compel " the United 
States" to step in and execute its "guaranty" by 



LOYALTY TO THE "CAUSE OF Till: WAR." -i 

putting arms and ballots into the hands of the loyal 

blacks. Several of our more northern States abol- 
ished slavery many years ago in the former way; 

several of our more southern States have of late 
abolished slavery in the latter way. In both ca 
the act of abolition binds all persons within the 
State, those who did not vote for the measure, as 
well as those who did. It was hard for the lovers of 
the institution in the more northern State- to give 
up their slaves merely because a majority of the 
people of a State did not like slavery ; so, in our more 
southern States, it is hard for true Union men to 
lose their slaves because the majority of the free- 
men chose to se # t up the institution on the gambling- 
board of secession. The States did what they 
thought proper to compensate the sufferers in the 
one case ; congress will do what she thinks proper 
to compensate the sufferers in the other case. 

There are many collateral questions connected 
with this argument, but I do not choose to discuss 
them now. Suffice it to say here, that both the 
Supreme Court of the United States, and the legis- 
lative and executive departments of our govern- 
ment, have alike settled every one of these questions, 
and, indeed, every question essential to the argu- 
ment, in harmony with the argument itself. God, w ho 
took this nation from its small beginnings, who filled 
the sails of the Mayflower with just the right 
breezes and just enough, who has watched over us 
in our errings as well as in our obedience; and who, 
as I believe, means to see fulfilled the decree which 
He has written on our streams, on our hilly ranges, on 



28 THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES. 

our valleys, and on our ocean-strands, that we shall 
remain forever one people, — took care, before this 
secession culminated, to draw out upon the printed 
page from the brains of the slavery-worshipping 
judges who have, for the most part, Bwayed our 
jurisprudence, such decisions, and such enunciations 
of doctrine, as well as from the other slavery-wor- 
shipping departments of the government, such legis- 
lative and other like precedents, as should leave our 
nation no alternative but to execute the law which 
shall stop the war and make us one, or to acknowl- 
edge before a hissing world, that our love of negro 
blood is more powerful than our love of freedom and 
of law. Let me repeat: the law I am here dis- 
cussing is no novelty; in its constituent principles 
it was settled before this war broke out. by the Su- 
preme Court of the United States, and by congress. 
Fellow-countrymen! Americans! You may con- 
tinue in the attempt to put down, by the clamor of 
false assertion, the truth of the law in this matter, 
if you will; but you will find that more and more 
bitter will be the morsel to the end. Vet let me 
hope, that mosl who joined in the falsehood knew 
not it was a falsehood they were uttering. We in 
this country talk of our Constitution, but we do 
not read it. When the Constitution shall be as 
much read as it is now talked about and written 
about by those who never read it. a happier day will 
dawn upon our country. 



CHAPTER III. 

THE USES OF OBEDIENCE TO THE LAW. 

The question lias agitated evil minds and weak 
minds during all ages of the world, — " What profit 
is there in obedience?" It has seemed strange to 
men of short vision and of perverted vision, that 
from out the Volume of Inspiration, from out the 
spaces through which sing the wheeling worlds above 
us, from' out the teeming ground beneath, IVom out 
air and cloud and azure sky, there should come the 
one unvarying voice, — " Obey the law." 

There is not space in these pages to enter upon a 
philosophical disquisition of this matter; what I 
shall here attempt will be simply to set down some 
views connected with the discussions of the last 
chapter, and with the conduct of the war generally. 
When the rebellion broke out, during the admin- 
istration of the late President Buchanan, the loyal 
part of the country was well united on one proposi- 
tion ; namely, that it would be unwise to enforce the 
laws against the actors in the rebellion ; better far, 
said almost all the people, would it be to let them 
pursue their evil course undisturbed, while we 
attempt to buy them off by offering what were 
termed amendments to the constitution, securing to 
them greater power, and to the loyal country which 

3* 



30 THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES. 

they had theretofore ruled, more abject submission. 
Had this plan succeeded, a temporary peace would 
indeed have intervened between the then present, 
and the more terrible future. But as it did not suc- 
ceed, as it could not succeed, — for the rebels dreamed 
of more power to be gained by the course they were 
pursuing than the majority of our people could pos- 
sibly be brought to yield voluntarily to them, — the 
remembrance of those days has left with it the 
thought, that, had the laws been obeyed by our gov- 
ernment and the loyal people thru, and the young 
treason smothered in its birth, the nation had been 
spared this war. Whence we may learn, that the 
sound law of the land may sometimes be better than 
the rotten policy of weak men. though the policy 
docs happen to be approved By the majority of the 
people. 

When the present administration came into power, 
with a war already upon its hands (lor the beginning 
of the war was before the attack on Fort Sumter), 
it took up this matter of "policy" where the old ad- 
ministration laid it down. Therefore, from the first 
to the last, under the Democratic rule and under 
the Republican rule, we hear of little except policy, 
Strategy, and things of this soil. 

Yet. at each Btep, as we look back upon the fail- 
ures of the past, we see that, had we followed le<s 
alter our notions of policy, and. more after the law. 
we should have done better. It may he too early 
now. yet it is almost time, to have it understood, 
that, if at the commencement of this war, reckoning 
the date now as far down as the attack on Fort 



USES OF OBEDIENCE TO THE LAW. 31 

Sumter, the administration had announced its 
intention to adhere to the law, giving to the slaves 
the freedom which the act of secession demanded 
should be given, under the Constitution of the United 
States, and the loyal country had adhered to the 
government in this course, the rebels, to prevenl 
this consequence, would then have laid down their 
arms, and accepted for their institution of slavery 
that protection which they had always enjoyed, and 
which they knew they always might enjoy. The 
leaders could have made their dupes at home 
believe, that this assurance of protection was the 
glorious result of the rebellion, which had thereby 
accomplished its object, so have kept their prestige 
and their power. But this was not to be, for God 
had decreed a different end for these troubles. 

Well, we went on driving the slaves from us, 
instead of receiving and arming them as we were 
bound to do; till, after weakening and almost de- 
stroying their amity toward us and our cause, we 
have come, at this late day, to the conclusion which 
was just as easily arrived at in the beginning of the 
war, that we cannot succeed without their help, and 
therefore we must accept and arm all we can in those 
parts of rebeldom which ive cannot get at. Here, policy 
approaches toward law, therefore is partly right. 
But, if it is politic to take this course now, was it 
politic to wait so long ? 

Then, in our relations abroad, how much embar- 
rassment should we have saved, not to speak of our 
good name, had we obeyed the law at first ! I speak 
not of how much suffering we should have saved to 



32 THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES. 

the poor operatives abroad ; because, with us, the 
idea of benevolence to the poor assumes so exclu- 
sively the form of benevolence to the poor blacks, 
to whom the blessings of slavery must be continued 
even at the expense of white woes, that 1 tear this 
part of my argument would operate rather against, 
than in favor of, the conclusion to which I would 
conduct the reader. 

Yet there are men who still think it is not politic 
for us to walk even so near the law as we do. They 
hare various propositions by which they settle this 
matter. Let us look at some of them ; they are 
married, — these propositions are, — so let us view 
them in pairs. 

1. Male Proposition. — The negroes must be kept 
in slavery, rise they will kill their m;istiT<. 

Female Proposition. — The negroes are such sub- 
dued, soft, and loving people toward their masters, 
that they can aever be induced to fighl against 
them. 

2. Malt Proposition. — The negroes are so brutal 
that, if we enlist them into our service, we can 
never restrain them within the limits of civilized 
warfare. 

Female Proposition. — The negroes are such tender- 
hearted creatures, that they cannot even he induced 
to shoot a gun at a mark, much less to point it toward 
a white human being. 

3. Male Proposition. — Oh, the horrors of St. Do- 
mingo ! where the negroes, in pursuit of their free- 
dom, whipped their masters and all France besides ! 

Female Proposition. — A negro slave will not even 
accept of freedom, much less will fight for it. 



USES OP OBEDIENCE TO THE LAW. 33 

4. Male Proposition. — We cannot get access to the 
nee-roes, therefore we should not offer to arm them. 

Female Proposition. — We should not take the ne- 
groes whom we can get access to, this would be 
unfair toward loyal citizens in rebeldom. 

5. Male- Proposition. — If we must take the negroes, 
let us not pay them with the true pay -of a soldier, 
freedom; but send them back, after they have 
served us, to the blessings of slavery ; at all events, 
let us send their wives, children, and kindred back. 

Female Proposition. — The negroes are ungrateful 
wretches; for they are just as ready to fight for 
their masters, as for us their friends. 

6. Male Proposition. — The early history of this 
war has shown, that, when the negroes can gain 
nothing by rising against their masters, but every 
thing by keeping quiet, they will not rise ; there- 
fore they are too stupid to be of service to us. 

Female Proposition. — The negroes were too bright 
to disobey the President's proclamation, which, in 
effect, required them, if they would receive its bene- 
fits, to remain quietly at home ; therefore they were 
not patriotic, they should have risen against their 
masters, therefore they will be useless on the loyal side. 

7. Male Proposition. — It is not right to let the 
blacks fight for us; because, if we do, it will be our 
fighting for their liberty, and our boys have great 
objections against fighting for niggers. 

Female Proposition. — It would be unseemly for us 
to accept peace to our country at the hands of negro 
slaves. 

I do not propose to discuss these propositions, so 



34 THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES. 

1 pass on. It is hard to argue against policy, be- 
cause policy means the quantum, more or less, of wis- 
dom, which the skull of the politic man may chance 
to contain ; therefore, though I may convince a 
third person that the politic man is wrong, I cannot 
convince him ; his skull is full ; it can hold nothing 
more. 

The number of whites in rebeldom intense, or the 
original seven seceding States, is not greatly in excess 
of the number of blacks; in South Carolina, also in 
Mississippij there were at the breaking out of the 
war, more enslaved negroes than free whites. In the 
four States that followed these seven, there were much 
nearer two than three times as many whites as 
blacks. It is something, then. — so. at least, it will 
seem to men who are not politic alter the negro- 
hate fashion, — to have one half, or even one third, 
of the people on the loyal side, instead of having 
them practically On the side of the disloyal, though 
their color may not jusl suit US, and though it does 
suit US to despise and slander them. 

Who are our negro slaves? They are men and 
women, who, during all their lives, have enjoyed the 
blessings of what we are assured by the highesl au- 
thority in our land, is one of the most beneficent 
institutions on earth ; namely. American slavery. 
Their ancestors were indeed barbarians; so were 
ours. They were not born in a land of heathenism, 
of barbarism ; they were not educated by low and 
degraded [tarents; on the other hand, each one of 
them was horn on American soil, and, what is more, 
whatever might have been the color or standing of 



USES OF OBEDIENCE TO THE LAW. 00 

his mother or his father, was born into the hands, 
into the power, completely in all respects within the 
control, of some chivalric white gentlemen of our 
own race and blood, by whom he has been reared ;i^ 
this white gentleman, not as some negro, thoughl lii 
to direct, Moreover, many of them bear the best 
and purest white-gentlemen blood of the country in 
their veins; and these all were born of just the 
mothers whom, in preference to all others, the white- 
gentlemen fathers selected. 

This last is an immense point in favor of the 
negroes. A peer of England, after fixing his eye 
upon a maiden, and feeling in his soul that unless she 
becomes the mother of his children, the lordly race 
will run low, may be rebuffed by those cold and ter- 
rible words, " I do not love you," and so the progeny 
suffer. But not so with the American peer of the 
lash. In our more blissful South, the " course of true 
love," when it follows an ebon maiden, can never 
thus be turned back. There the progeny does not 
suffer. 

And though the slave child mav not have a white 
father according to blood, he has always one, as 
already intimated, according to law. By the laws of 
all the States, where slavery exists, there is no slave 
father, there is no slave mother, with the rights and 
duties of father and mother ; but the law of this most 
beneficent institution, out of tender regard to the 
interest of the children, places them in all respects, 
under the control, under the education, under the 
tender and considerate care, of white gentlemen and 
their white wives. Moreover, the white gentlemen 



36 THOUGHTS FOR THE TIMES. 

into whose hands the slave-babies fall, are not the 
" poor white trash " of the slave States ; they are the 
wealthy, the refined, the first gentlemen of the 
States. 

Such are the slaves, such is their education under 
the beneficent institution. There can be no baser 
slander than to call them barbarians. Born in a 
Christian land, falling at birth into the hands of 
Christian gentlemen, reared up by them under the 
fostering care of one of the most beneficent institu- 
tions on earth, — call them barbarians! Say it 
would be an outrage in civilized warfare to set them 
in battle against the " white trash," or even the 
lordly peers of the lash, of the South! No! if they 
air not of the first order of society there, they are 
of the second; else slavery is not, in truth, the be- 
neficent institution we arc assured it is. 

1 can only close this tract in the words of a book 
which by Protestants is called apocryphal ; yet, what- 
ever may be it- merits ;i- matter of canonical author- 
ity, it speaks here what may well be a lesson to us. 
2 Mace. 3 : 1, 2. "Now when the holy city was 
inhabited with all peace, and the laws were kept very 
ivcll, because of the godliness of Onias the high- 
priest, and his hatred of wickedness, it came to pass 
that even the kings themselves did honor the place, 
and magnify the temple with their best gifts." 



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Jul y23l863 



1? LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



012 028 987 




